


The Prison and the Open Hand

by victoria_p (musesfool)



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Episode Tag, Gen, Grief
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-05-21
Updated: 2010-05-21
Packaged: 2017-10-09 15:19:21
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,993
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/88814
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/musesfool/pseuds/victoria_p
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Dean made a promise. Lisa respects that.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Prison and the Open Hand

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks to Nichole for hand-holding during the crazed title scramble. Spoilers through 5.22.

Faith is the prison and the open hand

*

That first night, Dean is up all night, and Lisa stays up with him as long as she can. The grey light of dawn is filtering through the blinds when she finally gives in to sleep. They end up tangled together on the couch, and when she wakes up, her t-shirt is still damp from tears and sweat, and her arm is numb from where he's lying on it. She uses her other hand to comb her fingers through the short hair on the back of his neck, not wanting to wake him, but also not thrilled with the idea of Ben finding them like this when he gets up. She shifts, and Dean jerks away from her, wide-eyed and wired, though she doesn't think he's seeing her. She doesn't want to know what he does see before he shakes himself back into the here-and-now.

"Hey," he says, trying to play it off, badly.

"Hey," she says, letting him.

She gets up and after she's done in the bathroom, she heads into the kitchen. It's Saturday morning, so Ben can sleep in, though he's usually up before she is on the weekends, even though he has to be dragged out of bed in the morning on schooldays. She knows Dean would never hurt her or Ben--at least not intentionally--but she wants to hold off on their reunion just a little longer, just until she figures out what she's going to do with him.

Of course, the smell of pancakes brings Ben barreling down the stairs fifteen minutes later, face lit up with glee. He stops short in the doorway when he sees Dean at the table, and then he slows down, saunters in like he's auditioning for the role of James Dean instead of a ten-year-old kid excited by the idea of pancakes for breakfast. She looks from one to the other and has to close her eyes and breathe deep to ease the ache in her chest. She had good reasons, but she still regrets the lie. She hopes Dean will forgive her when he learns the truth.

"Hey," Dean says again.

"Hey." Ben holds out his fist and Dean looks startled for a second before he bumps it with his own. "Are there monsters again?" Ben asks. "Is that why you're here?"

Dean looks away and then back, the skin around his eyes and mouth tight as he attempts a smile that looks like it hurts. "No, Ben. No monsters. Not this time."

Ben nods. "It's cool." He turns and gives her a nod, too. She thinks about asking for a hug and kiss, because he's usually pretty affectionate, but he's been drawing away from her in public for a while now--he hasn't given her a kiss goodbye or held her hand in public for a couple of years now (she's still sad about it)--but these days he doesn't even like getting dropped off at school or a friends' house, too afraid of being called a mama's boy to let her be seen with him, let alone cuddle. Dean obviously counts as public right now, and she can live with that.

Dean doesn't finish his short stack, but Ben doesn't seem to notice as he chatters about school and sports and the last AC/DC album. Dean nods and grunts in the appropriate places most of the time, and he stands up when she does, uncertain look on his face.

"Why don't you take a shower while Ben and I clean up?" she says.

Dean nods. "Okay."

He goes out to his car to pick up some clothes and Ben says, "Is he staying with us now?"

"Only for a few days," she answers.

"Mom." Ben makes a face, like he's winding up to pitch her on why Dean should stay, as if it's the same thing as taking in a stray puppy.

"We're gonna help him find someplace to live."

*

Three days later, Dean's drunk his way through the Jim Beam in her liquor cabinet and started on the Jack Daniels, and Lisa's spoken with the realtor who helped her move into the new house after the changeling incident.

Dean wanders into the kitchen and comes back with a mug of coffee. He sits next to her on the couch and she wrinkles her nose when he leans in to see what's on the laptop screen. "Have some coffee with your whiskey?" she asks.

His mouth twists. "It's bourbon." He takes a sip, but she can see the bravado in it, knows he'll crack if she keeps pushing. He looks at the screen again, and she can see it register in his eyes. "You're kicking me out?"

"You planning on staying this time?" He huffs in acknowledgement, and she feels another pang of regret. "Let's not do this."

He stands and nods, jaw clenched tight enough to make the muscle tic. "Let's not." He turns to go, and she gets up, puts a hand on his arm.

"That's not what I meant."

He turns back, glances down at her hand, eyes narrow and assessing. She can feel the threat in his gaze. This is why she doesn't want him living here, even though she believes he'd never hurt her or Ben. Not intentionally.

"What are you doing?"

She tightens her fingers around his wrist. "I'm helping you find a place to live."

He nods, gaze gone flat and empty. "Yeah, I'm just itching to do that."

"Dean." She says it the way she'd say Ben's name, but Dean isn't a ten-year-old boy, and he's definitely not her son. She knows it's a mistake even before he speaks.

"Don't. You don't get to--"

"I'm trying to help, Dean."

"Thanks for that."

She drops his wrist and shakes her head. "Look, I'm sorry. I didn't get a lot of sleep," another mistake, to remind him that it's his nightmares that keep waking them up, but she can't take it back now, so she keeps going, "so I'm not--I'm not being very tactful. But a place of your own--my realtor already has a couple places lined up that she can show us today. All of them are nearby."

"And what exactly am I supposed to use for rent money? I've been officially dead for two years."

"What did you do for money before?"

He laughs. It's not a pleasant sound. "Not the nine-to-five shuck and jive." He swivels the laptop around so he can type, his fingers quick and sure over the keys. "Not then, and not now."

It's all there in blue and white, 879,000 search results in Google detailing his crimes, complete with mug shots and police sketches. There's even a Wikipedia page. She remembers the credit cards with the fake names that he tried to give her, the articles she'd dug up that called him a bank robber, and worse, a serial killer.

"But who wouldn't want me for a tenant? At least I'd make sure the bodies were burned before I left." He takes a long sip of his coffee-laced bourbon, as if that can wash away the bitterness in his voice.

"There has to be a way--a fake social security number, a new last name..." She trails off uncertainly.

"Sure, but that kind of paperwork takes time and money." His tone is reasonable, professional, even, and that weirds her out more than anything else.

"Okay," she says, "okay." She runs a hand through her hair. "We'll figure something out." She takes the coffee cup out of his hand, and he's surprised enough that he lets her. "But no drinking at the breakfast table, okay? And no hard stuff while Ben is around." She raises her chin, forces him to meet her gaze squarely.

"I'll try," he says, and it's not good enough, but for the moment, she'll take it.

*

They settle into a routine over the next few days. Ben doesn't question why Dean wakes up yelling sometimes; he and Lisa both had nightmares for months after the incident with the changelings. She finds Dean holding Ben's old stuffed lion on the couch one morning; he gives her a small smile that looks like heartbreak.

"He's a good kid."

Her voice is rough when she says, "Yeah."

*

Lisa tries to get Dean to open up, to tell her _something_, especially since there isn't anybody else she can ask. All he'll say is that Sam saved the world, and died in the process. As awful as that sounds, she thinks there has to be more to it than that. Then she remembers the cold terror of Ben gone missing, some _thing_ in his place, and doesn't press. She knows words won't help, so she doesn't offer them.

A week after Dean showed up on her doorstep, Lisa wakes up out of a nightmare of her own. After she checks on Ben (still breathing, still whole, still and always her baby, however old he gets), she finds Dean drinking in the dark at the kitchen table, only the Tweety-bird nightlight for company. He's got a lighter in his hand that he keeps opening and closing, and she has to stop and swallow down the breath that catches in her throat before she says, "You must be very proud."

The lighter clatters to the table, and she reaches out, takes it, and puts it in the pocket of her bathrobe.

"What?"

"Of Sam."

He scrubs a hand across his face, and when he lowers it, she can see the tears clinging to his lashes, and smeared over the shadows beneath his eyes. "Yeah."

"When my father died," she starts, but he cuts her off.

"Don't." He shakes his head and holds up a hand. "Don't give me the 'you're not the only one who's ever lost anyone' speech, okay?" He takes a drink and she can see his hand shake ever so slightly. "If it was just that he was dead--that would suck, but maybe I could learn to live with it. I don't know. But he's not."

"He's not dead?" Lisa reaches out carefully, takes his hand, and squeezes. He squeezes back, hard enough to grind her knuckles together. She bites her lip against the pain.

"He's in hell." Dean sucks in a breath that sounds like it's as much snot as air. "I mean that literally. I've been there myself. It's," he gestures with the glass in his other hand, "it's indescribable. It's _hell_."

She can't make any sense of what he's saying, though it's clear that he believes it. Maybe at three a.m. after dreaming about creatures that steal children and suck the life out of their mothers, she can believe it, too.

"But you're here," she says. "So there must be some way out."

He shrugs. "Yeah. No. I don't know."

"Come on." She tugs him into the living room, where her laptop is sitting on the coffee table.

He shakes his head. "Even if there's a way--even if we could find it--I promised I wouldn't." He sounds like Ben when he really wants to tell her what's going on, but is afraid of being called a tattletale. "I _promised_."

"Okay, Dean. I won't ask you to break your promise." Still, she opens up the laptop. "What should I look for?"

"Lisa, I can't--"

"You made a promise, Dean, for whatever reason, and I respect that." She tugs him down onto the couch next to her. "But _I_ didn't." She rests her fingers on the keyboard and gives him a tentative smile. She gasps in surprise when he leans in and kisses her softly. He pulls away, and for the first time, there's a glint of something in his eyes that gives her hope. She squeezes his hand again and says, "Let's see what we can find."

end

~*~

Notes: Title and cut-text from "Augustine" by Vienna Teng.

~*~

**Author's Note:**

> Title and quote from "Augustine" by Vienna Teng.


End file.
